Red
by Starchains
Summary: Lily Luna is kidnapped by Muggles. It's very traumatic for everyone involved.


Lily Luna Potter stormed out of the house, towards the Muggle village she wasn't supposed to visit without supervision. It wasn't fair! She knew that Jamie had borrowed Teddy's wand to practice magic, and Al had borrowed Jamie's. Everyone did it, and it wasn't as if the Ministry could tell. But because she was a girl, or the youngest, or whatever stupid reason her Mum had, she wasn't supposed to. Same as she wasn't supposed to use her brother's brooms, only her rubbish training one, or wasn't supposed to use Uncle George's tricks on her brothers. She was nine, she wasn't a baby. How could they tell her all the stories of all the incredible things they'd done, and then not expect her to want to try them for herself? How was she supposed to be a great witch like her Grandma Lily, or Aunt Hermione, or Tante Fleur if the first time she used a wand was at Hogwarts?

Searching her pockets as she approached the Muggle sweet shop, she found a couple of Pepper Imps and a Fainting Fancy with no antidote. No Muggle money at all, so she couldn't even buy anything. Turning on her heel in a way she'd seen Victoire do when she wanted to show how utterly disgusted with someone she was, she almost ran into a pair of Muggles.

"Oh!" she exclaimed, nearly falling over and just managing to catch herself. "Excuse me, please."

The Muggles didn't move. One of them smiled awkwardly, running a hand through his brown hair. "Could you help us, please? We're looking for the bank."

"I'm sorry, I'm not from around here." It was the response her Dad had told her to give, so people didn't get curious about how she could live locally and not go to the local school or anything. It wasn't as if she'd ever need to use a Muggle bank anyway.

"Sorry for bothering you, then," the smiling one said, moving aside so she could pass.

She hadn't taken two steps before she felt a hand across her mouth and a sharp prick in her arm. The world spun into blackness.

Her head felt full of cotton wool and her mouth tasted like the inside of a pillow when she woke up. The hard floor was jolting underneath her, and her arms were tied behind her back, so tightly that her shoulders ached. There was a cloth in her mouth and some kind of bag over her head. It was disgustingly hot and hard to breath.

She could hear Smiling Man and a voice she didn't recognise, which was probably his friend. She couldn't make out their words, it was just a low buzz half drowned out by her own breathing. She made herself calm down and focus on what they were saying. As her breathing slowed down, she could make out some of the words, but she didn't understand them. It sounded a little like French, so it was probably a European language. Spanish, maybe, or Italian?

Why would Italians or Spaniards want to kidnap her? When her Dad had warned her about dangerous people, it had people who still were loyal to the Dark Lord he'd killed as a teenager, or people who he'd arrested, or crazy fans of her mother. All witches and wizards, never two foreign Muggle men. What was going on?

She was jolted by a particularly hard bump of the floor, making her head jerk up and slam back down. It made tears come to her eyes, and once she started crying she couldn't stop. She was sobbing, choking on the cloth in her mouth, the fabric of the bag sticking to her wet eyes. She wanted to go home, she wanted Dad to find her and beat the bad guys and rescue her. She wanted to hug her Mum and say sorry.

She carried on crying until the lack of air made her pass out again.

The next time she woke up, she was laid on a floor that wasn't moving. Blinking her eyes open slowly, she saw that she was in a white room slightly smaller than her bedroom. She sat up carefully, wincing she moved her stiff, but thankfully no longer bound, arms.

"Here," a pale boy with eyes like Miss Cho offered her a bottle of water.

She greedily gulped down the stale, warm water, gasping with relief as it washed away the woolly dryness of her mouth. The boy took the water back before she could drink any more.

"Where are we?" she asked quietly. Now that she had a moment to look around, she noticed that she and the boy weren't the only ones in the room. There were two other girls and a boy huddled in a corner.

"I heard the men speaking Italian. I think they're Mafia," the boy whispered back. His accent was thick, but she could understand him.

"Mafia? Like Mu - like criminals?" She drew on a hazy memory of her Dad talking about organised crime and Teddy describing Muggle movies.

"Yeah. I don't know what they want. I would ask the others, but we don't have any language in common."

"Maybe I will. I speak French, have you tried that? I'm Lily Luna," she said, realising that she hadn't introduced herself.

"I'm Kaito. I only speak Japanese, English and Italian. Maybe French will work," he said encouragingly.

Lily climbed shakily to her feet and staggered over to the huddle. They watched her approach with scared eyes. If they hadn't been in a corner, Lily had the feeling that they would try to run.

"Hello. My name is Lily Luna," she said in French, incredibly grateful for her Tante Fleur's lessons.

One of the girls smiled back at her. "Hello. I'm Justine. This is Marie," she motioned at the other girl, who waved, "and Lukas." The small boy ducked his head, hiding behind his long dark hair.

Kaito came over and sat with them, and Lily made the introductions. Holding a conversation was awkward, with Lily and Kaito the only two who spoke English, Lily, Justine and Marie speaking French, and Marie and Lukas speaking German, although in Marie's case it was only a little, barely enough to get by.

"What are we going to do?" Marie whispered. The blonde girl hadn't stopped crying, and she kept wiping her nose on her sleeve.

"What do we have?" Lily asked. A quick survey revealed that Lily and Lukas were the best equipped, with her Pepper Imps and Fainting Fancy. Kaito had a handkerchief, which he passed to Marie, and a half-filled notebook. Justine and Marie were in sundresses with no pockets, so they had nothing at all, and Lukas had a key with a mini torch and a pen on the keyring.

"Do we want to wait and see what they want, and if rescue comes, or do we want to try and fight and escape?" Kaito asked.

Marie whimpered at the thought of fighting. She wasn't in any state to translate, so Lukas was left watching the conversation blankly, not that he seemed all that interested in joining in.

"How could we fight? Shine the light in a guards eyes?" Justine asked. She was trying to sound tough, but her voice trembled too much for it to be convincing.

It sounded ridiculous. Lily wanted to curl up in a ball and cry. She wanted to wait for Dad to come and save her. But she knew she had to brave. Dad didn't know where she was. She had to save herself.

"I doubt they want us for anything good. If we don't escape now, we might not be able to," Kaito said.

"I want my Mum!" Marie wailed, reaching her breaking point at Kaito's dire warning. Justine cuddled her, trying to quiet her down, and Lukas patted her back awkwardly.

"Lily," Kaito said, determined to carry on the plan making even if she was the only one listening. "Do you have anyone you could call to help?"

"No," she admitted. She knew that Aunt Hermione had a phone but she didn't know the number. She wished now that she had memorised it like Aunt Hermione had always insisted she should, but she had never thought she'd need it.

"I have one. It's for the Foundation. My father works for them. They're an organisation in Japan, and they're friends with the Vongola Family."

"Vongola?" Lily was lost.

"They're a Mafia family in Italy, but they're friendly." He rattled off a string of numbers. Lily tried to repeat them back to him, but she couldn't keep them straight. Kaito bit his lip in frustration, before scampering over to Lukas.

Marie had stopped crying, and seemed to have explained to Lukas about the questions of whether they should try to escape or not. The three of them were having a hushed conversation, mostly in French too quick for her to follow.

"I need his pen," Kaito said. Lily translated the request to Marie, who asked Lukas, who passed it over.

Kaito wrote the number on Lily's arm, and then on the arms of the other three.

"Call them," he insisted. "They're strong. They can save us."

Marie smiled, blowing her nose on Kaito's handkerchief. The little bit of hope the phone number represented seemed to give her new life.

Lily knew that the Statute of Secrecy meant she shouldn't reveal Magic to Muggles, but she didn't see a choice.

"These sweets are special," she said, once in English for Kaito, and then again in French for the girls. Marie translated awkwardly for Lukas.

"These can burn a hole through your tongue," she pointed to the Pepper Imps, "and this will knock someone unconscious," she showed them the Fainting Fancy.

They all expressed disbelief, but with no way to prove it without wasting their precious resources, they had no choice but to believe her. Soon, they hashed out a vague plan. As soon as a guard came into the room, they would offer him the Fainting Fancy and cry or beg until he ate it. Then they would search him for a phone and call for help. It wasn't a great plan, but it filled them all with a sense of purpose.

They waited in a group, both anxious for and dreading the arrival of one of their captors. They hoped that they would come individually. If they came as a pair, the best they could do was give one of them a Pepper Imp and hope that the burning distracted him long enough for them to subdue him somehow.

When the man came, he was alone. Lily stood up as he burst through the door, slamming it behind him. She smiled as best she could and prepared to offer him a sweet, but before she could get the first words out of her mouth, the man was shouting at Kaito in Japanese, pointing a metal stick at him. Kaito was replying, speaking back in Japanese, pleading with his hands stretched in front of him.

Lily took a deep breath, but before she could interrupt, the man pointed his metal stick at Kaito's head. There was a deafening bang, like the time that Jamie had let off a firework right next to her ear. When she blinked her eyes open, ears still ringing, she saw Kaito's body lying on the floor. His head was missing, a red lumpy mess where it should have been. She stared at it in horror, at what remained of the boy who had given her water and hope.

There was a noise like shouting coming from very far away. She ignored it. It couldn't possibly be as important as Kaito. There was no way even Saint Mungo's could fix this. Not even with the best Healers in the world. The distant shouting continued, and a heavy hand landed on her shoulder.

She spun round, the world coming back into focus. The murderer was shouting at her, spitting at her face. She felt icy cold, separate from her body. She just wanted him to stop shouting. Kaito couldn't hear him anymore.

She gently placed a hand over his mouth. It worked to shut her brothers up when they fought. The man hit her, sending her stumbling back, tripping over into a puddle. The man stumbled as well a moment later, falling hard and slamming his head against the wall. She must have used the hand with the Fainting Fancy. She had forgotten that she had been holding it. The plan was useless now, anyway. Lily pushed herself to her feet and realised her hands were smeared with thick red liquid. It smelled like iron and raw meat.

The mess on her hand smeared all over the man's pockets as she searched for a phone. Kaito had given her a number. She had to call it. The phone was hidden in one of the inside pockets; she had to unbutton his jacket to get to it. The man's chest was moving slowly, up and down. Kaito's chest had been completely still.

It was easy to use. She carefully pushed the buttons, entering the number Kaito had written on her arm. Pushing it to her ear, she thought she could hear it ring. It became clearer as she focused on it. Accidental magic, maybe? Where was it when Kaito needed it? What a silly thing for her magic to help her with.

A woman answered the phone, speaking in Japanese. Lily spoke in English. Kaito had spoken English. Maybe this woman would as well.

"My name is Lily Luna. I was kidnapped. So was Kaito. He said you were the Foundation and you could help because you were friends with the Vongola." She could hear her own voice. It sounded cold and calm and distant.

The woman stuttered something, and music started playing. Lily kept the phone held to her ear while she searched the man for anything else useful. She picked up the metal stick, a set of keys and a tiny box before another voice came on the phone.

"Where are you?" The voice was male this time, and he spoke English with led of an accent than Kaito had.

"I don't know. Kaito said he thought we were in Italy. I don't think the others know."

"How many of you are there?" The voice was calm and business-like. Lily trusted the voice.

"Me and Marie and Justine and Lukas."

"Where is Kaito?"

Suddenly all her calm and cold collapsed. She gasped, not able to get a breath. All she could taste in the air was blood. Kaito's blood, smeared on her skin and soaked into her skirt and her shoes and covering the floor. Kaito was just there, but he was gone, and he was dead, and he didn't have a head and there nothing she could do.

"Breathe, small animal. Breathe in for me," the voice on the phone was talking.

She did her best to obey, taking a gulp of air in, then a shuddering breath out.

"He's dead, they shot him, his head's gone, it's gone-" she was whimpering, she couldn't stop, she couldn't think.

"Are you hurt, small animal?" The voice was still calm, still in charge.

"I - no. I'm fine. He hit me but I'm fine."

"Are the others hurt?"

Lily hadn't even checked. She looked for the first time at the other three, cowering in their corner.

"Are you hurt?" she asked. When they stared blankly at her, she repeated the question in French. It took some charades to get the idea across to them after Justine gestured to her ears and shook her head, and the puddle of sick next to them said that their nods and shaky smiles were a lie, but she didn't call them on it.

"They say they're fine," she told the voice.

"That's good, small animal. I've called the Vongola. They are tracking this call, and they will be with you soon. Are you somewhere safe?"

"We're in the room they put us in. The man who...who..." she couldn't make herself say it. She had to stay calm. "He hit his head and he's unconscious."

"That's good. Does he have any weapons on him?"

"He had the weapon he used to kill Kaito, and a box." She had no idea what the metal stick was, let alone how to use it, and didn't know whether the box could be some kind of Muggle weapon as well.

"What colour is the box, small animal?"

"My name is Lily Luna," she said. She liked being called small animal, a little. It made it sound like the voice was a big animal, who could protect her and Justine and Marie and Lukas.

"My name is Hibari, small animal. What colour is the box?" The voice - Hibari - was still calm, but there was a tone in his voice like maybe he was laughing at her.

She looked at the box. It was bright red, with a circle cut into the top. She told Hibari.

"Is the man wearing a red ring?" he asked. Lily frowned at the question but went to check.

He was, but to take it off she had to put the Muggle weapons down. As she tried to juggle weapon, box and phone Justine touched her arm. Lily was surprised to see her out of the corner, and even more surprised when she took the Muggle stick. By the determined look on her face, Justine was ready and willing to use it on anyone who came through the door. Lily thanked her, although it didn't look like Justine could hear it.

With her hand free she managed to work the ring off the man's finger.

"The ring and box might be able to defend you, small animal," Hibari said. "Put the ring on and focus on how much you want to protect your friends. How angry you are that Kaito is dead. Focus all that resolve into the ring. If you manage to get a flame to light, press it to the circle in the box."

Hibari didn't sound like there was anything wrong with wearing jewellery from a murderer and using it to set fire to a box. Maybe this was how Muggle weapons worked? She closed her eyes, taking a deep breath. Immediately the taste of blood assaulted her again, and with it the anger and fear and terror and grief. It took her breath away, but it wasn't what she needed. She needed resolve. She needed to be strong.

The door slamming open made her open her eyes. Justine was pointing the weapon at a pair of shouting Italians. They were reaching for their metal sticks, and Justine was shaking. She wasn't attacking, and the men would, and then Justine and Marie and Lukas would be dead just like Kaito.

She couldn't let it happen. She was Lily Luna Potter. She was the daughter of Harry and Ginny Potter. She would protect her friends. As the men pointed their weapons, Lily slammed the glowing ring into the box.

A red flare made her shut her eyes. When she opened them again, the men were on the floor. A giant panther was biting one, and it looked like his flesh was dissolving from the bite. The other was screaming on the floor. His leg had a giant hole in it, and Justine was standing over him, metal stick in hand.

The man being bitten and disintegrated whimpered and went limp as the dissolving effect reached his chest. The man with the hole in his leg went still as well, but his chest was still moving up and down, so he was still alive.

"A panther. The box had a panther," she told Hibari, who was still on the phone.

"The panther will protect you and your companions, small animal. You've done well. The Vongola are almost there." Hibari still sounded calm and in control.

The panther came over and shoved her - his? her head under her free hand. She petted her gently, listening to her purr. She'd just seen her kill someone, but she wasn't scared of her.

"Will you stay on the phone, Mr Hibari?" she asked. She was very tired, and Mr Hibari had saved them with the ring and the box.

"I'll stay, small animal." His voice was gentle.

Lily sat down with Justine and Marie and Lukas, still holding the phone to her ear. She listened to him read his paperwork aloud to her as the panther stalked back and forth across the small room until the door opened yet again.

"Are you Mr Hibari's friend?" she asked the fluffy haired man with gloves of orange fire.

"Yes I am." The man smiled.

Mr Hibari confirmed his identity as Sawada Tsunayoshi, the head of Vongola. At Mr Hibari's word that they were safe, Lily finally let the flame on her ring sputter out. Mr Hibari's voice was the last thing she heard before she slid into unconsciousness.


End file.
